Wilderness First Aid Basics

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BACKCOUNTRY SKILLS

What most first-aid courses don't tell you.

Before the bandages, before the dressing, before the splints and sutures, wilderness first aid must address certain basic problems, regardless of the injury or illness, that conventional first-aid courses often omit. When you are miles from help with an injured person depending upon you for his or her life, you'll probably be forced to leave him or her while you get help. How do you assess an injury and keep that injured person as stable and comfortable as possible while you seek professional assistance? Four conditions must be assessed from the first moment.

Breathing Problems

Many an injured person has died needlessly in the wilderness simply because he was left lying on his back while someone went for help. In most cases, he became unconscious and his relaxed tongue fell back and blocked his air passage. III some cases he vomited, and because he was on his back and unable to help himself, he got some of the vomit into his lungs. The acid in the vomit caused a fast-acting pneumonia, which killed him quickly. In still other cases, blood from his nose or mouth collected in the airway and he asphyxiated.

If his companion had simply placed him on his side and braced him there before going for help, he might not have died. What a simple thing to make the difference between life and death! An Unconscious person who is placed on his side to protect against fluids in his airway is said to be in the recovery position, because in that position he may regain consciousness without danger of suffocation. It is also called the drainage position because it allows fluids to drain from the mouth and throat without blocking the airway. Placing ail unconscious casualty in this position is one of the most basic parts of first aid.

Other casualties have died because they could not get enough air. Again, simple body position makes a difference. A person lying down cannot breathe as well as one sitting up. This is because when we lie down, our intestines tend to move up and push against the diaphragm, the flat sheet-like muscle that separates Our lungs and vital organs, and helps us to breathe. Lying down keeps the diaphragm from working well, so we get less air into the lungs. That is why people with breathing problems such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), emphysema, or asthma prefer to sit up. 'that is why we put people in a sitting or semi-sitting position whenever they have trouble getting air.

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